In this fine novel, a mental illness lends brutal, uncanny insight into reality in general. Deborah, a young schizophrenic, has two worlds: Yri, a remarkably complete fantasy; and a real one made up of pain, rejection and her own brilliant . The two worlds fight it out in the violent ward of an asylum and back, re- much about insanity and about the normal reality into which Deborah finally escapes. The asylum scenes are remarkable for a white hot, inside understanding of nurse-doctor-patient relations and of the reasons within violent insanity. Sickness a protection. And Deborah, struggling both for and against her one safety, is self-destructive, and yet touchingly, fiercely intelligent. Her intelligence saves her, validating the enormous powers of mind itself. A striking, poetic and intensely engrossing book.